Long Good Friend Quotes & Sayings

As Buddhism has been integrated into the West, the meaning of sangha has come to include all our contemporaries who in various ways are consciously pursuing a path of awakening. We are held by sangha when we work individually with a therapist or healer, or when a close friend lets us be vulnerable and real. Taking refuge in the sangha reminds us that we are in good company: We belong with all those who long to awaken, with all those who seek the teachings and practices that lead to genuine peace. — Tara Brach

Long visits don't make for good friends. — J.M. Coetzee

My lawyer has been a good friend of mine for a long time. He and I continuously have conversations. — Matthew McConaughey

Harold Ramis really got my career going and was a friend for a long time. I was doing a play in L.A., and he came to see it a few times and recommended me to Ivan Reitman for Ghostbusters 2. Six months later, I quit real estate and was acting for good, and it was really because Harold took an interest in me and made a phone call and did stuff that people don't usually do, even if they like somebody. — Kurt Fuller

Every time we make the decision to love someone, we open ourselves to great suffering, because those we most love cause us not only great joy but also great pain. The greatest pain comes from leaving. When the child leaves home, when the husband or wife leaves for a long period of time or for good, when the beloved friend departs to another country or dies ... the pain of the leaving can tear us apart.
Still, if we want to avoid the suffering of leaving, we will never experience the joy of loving. And love is stronger than fear, life stronger than death, hope stronger than despair. We have to trust that the risk of loving is always worth taking. — Henri J.M. Nouwen

Misanthropes have some admirable - if paradoxical - virtues. It is no exaggeration to say that we are among the nicest people you are likely to meet. Because good manners build sturdy walls, our distaste for intimacy makes us exceedingly cordial. "ships that pass in the night." As long as you remain a stranger we will be your friend forever. — Florence King

On, I don't think I'm a genius!' cried Josie, growing calm and sober as she listened to the melodious voice and looked into the expressive face that filled her with confidence, so strong, sincere and kindly was it. 'I only want to find out if I have talent enough to go on, and after years of study be able to act well in any of the good plays people never tire of seeing. I don't expected to be a Mrs. Siddons or a Miss Cameron, much as I long to be; but it does seem as if I had something in me which can't come out in any way but this. When I act I'm perfectly happy. I seem to live, to be in my own world, and each new part is a new friend. I love Shakespeare, and am never tired of his splendid people. Of course I don't understand it all; but it's like being alone at night with the mountains and the stars, solemn and grand, and I try to imagine how it will look when the sun comes up, and all is glorious and clear to me. I can't see, but I feel the beauty, and long to express it. — Louisa May Alcott

We're glad you're here." Brastias stood beside her now, covered in blood, the majority of which she doubted belonged to him.
"Sorry I took so long, my friend." She tested the weight of her blades. As always they felt good in her hands. She was ready.
"Where is he, Brastias?"
"Up there." He pointed to a ridge where she could hear the war cries of men. But between her and her brother lay a battery of troops screaming for her blood.
One soldier ran for her, the blood lust having grabbed hold of his mind. She brought her two swords together, stepping aside as the man's head snapped off his body.
Annwyl smiled at Brastias. "Perhaps you should let me take this from here."
She wondered what he saw on her face when she looked at him, because he visibly blanched and backed away from her. "As always, Annwyl. They're all yours."
Annwyl smiled and charged in, killing all that stood in her way and did not wear the colors of her army. — G.A. Aiken

But like my young friend said, this is not the way it seems in the beginning. Before things go bad, it's just a night that sounds like a lot of fun. A day that feels like wasting. A risk that looks like something we can likely handle, a limb that'll probably hold our weight. We don't think getting back home will be a problem when we're finished. After all, we're not going far. Not until we're well down the mountain, much too far to pull ourselves easily back up to the top, we realize we've gotten ourselves into a mess. Instead of three or four good ways to get back on our feet, we now have maybe one - or none - none that don't come without a long, hard process, without a good bit of shame — Priscilla Shirer

A favored bit from "A Legend of Good Men"

"My mother and I each had our routines. She taught high school, took long hikes in the state parks near our house, read mystery novels, and sometimes disappeared with explanations as thin as, "I just need a few days," or "I'm going to visit a friend."
"Which friend?" I would ask.
"That's right," she would say. — David Vann

Haley and I would talk for hours about which member of 'N Sync we'd want to marry. After long deliberation, the answer was always J. C. Chasez. Joey
Fatone's last name was going to be "Fat One" no matter how great he was, and even though they didn't know at their
age that Lance Bass was gay outright, they sensed he'd make a better good friend and confidante. As for Justin Timberlake, well, JT was the coolest and hottest, but too flashy, so we couldn't trust him to be faithful. J. C. Chasez was the smart compromise. — Mindy Kaling

He was one of the most sincere tree-lovers I ever knew. About twenty years before his death he made choice of a plot in the Yosemite cemetery on the north side of the Valley, not far from the Yosemite Fall, and selecting a dozen or so of seedling sequoias in the Mariposa grove he brought them to the Valley and planted them around the spot he had chosen for his last rest. The ground there is gravelly and dry; by careful watering he finally nursed most of the seedlings into good, thrifty trees, and doubtless they will long shade the grave of their blessed lover and friend. — John Muir

There can be no nobler training than that, he replied. And therefore, I said, Glaucon, musical training is a more potent instrument than any other, because rhythm and harmony find their way into the inward places of the soul, on which they mightily fasten, imparting grace, and making the soul of him who is rightly educated graceful, or of him who is ill-educated ungraceful; and also because he who has received this true education of the inner being will most shrewdly perceive omissions or faults in art and nature, and with a true taste, while he praises and rejoices over and receives into his soul the good, and becomes noble and good, he will justly blame and hate the bad, now in the days of his youth, even before he is able to know the reason why; and when reason comes he will recognise and salute the friend with whom his education has made him long familiar. Yes, — Plato

Uh, Miss Carlson," I said, standing at her desk after everybody else had gone on to their next class, "somebody told me you went to that guy's funeral the one the highway patrol shot."
"Yes," SHe said. "I did."
She didn't look like she was mad at me about it. She had real long eyelashes. I bet she was good-looking when she was young.
"Was he a relative or something?" That was what I was afraid of.
"No. Not even a friend really." She paused, like she was hunting for the right words. Finally she said, "I read a book once that ended with the words 'the incommunicable past' You can only share the past with someone who's shared it with you. So I can't explain to you what Mark was to me, exactly. I knew him a long time ago. — S.E. Hinton

But death was her curse and her gift, and death had been her good friend these long, long years. — Sarah J. Maas

Oh how lovely to hear the birds!' an elderly friend recently exclaimed. I smiled, 'Yes, isn't it?' Actually it reminded me of living in my ex's flat; those early mornings being woken up by the incessant chirping of baby birds and myself at the window with an air rifle. Good times. Because that's the other thing about working alone for long periods of time, you begin to get nostalgic about all the rubbish. — Emily Benet

It was generally agreed that a coffin-size studio on Avenue D was preferable to living in one of the boroughs. Moving from one Brooklyn or Staten Island neighborhood to another was fine, but unless you had children to think about, even the homeless saw it as a step down to leave Manhattan. Customers quitting the island for Astoria or Cobble Hill would claim to welcome the change of pace, saying it would be nice to finally have a garden or live a little closer to the airport. They'd put a good face one it, but one could always detect an underlying sense of defeat. The apartments might be bigger and cheaper in other places, but one could never count on their old circle of friend making the long trip to attend a birthday party. Even Washington Heights was considered a stretch. People referred to it as Upstate New York, though it was right there in Manhattan. — David Sedaris

My good friend the Governor said I could settle down at Port Stanley and take things quietly for a few weeks. The street of that port is about a mile and a half long. It has the slaughterhouse at one end and the graveyard at the other. The chief distraction is to walk from the slaughterhouse to the graveyard. For a change one may walk from the graveyard to the slaughterhouse. — Ernest Shackleton

Dave watched him standing up at the bar, chatting with one of the old dockworkers as he waited for his drinks, Dave thinking the guys in here knew what it was to be men. Men without doubts, men who never questioned the rightness of their own actions, men who weren't confused by the world or what was expected of them in it.
It was fear, he guessed. That's what he'd always had that they didn't. Fear had settled into him at such an early age - permanently, the way Val's prison friend had claimed sadness did. Fear had founda place in Dave and never left, and so he feared doing wrong and he feared fucking up and he feared not being intelligent and he feared not being a good husband or a good father or much of a man. Fear had been in him so long he wasn't sure he could remember what it had felt like to live without it. — Dennis Lehane

And therefore, I said, Glaucon, musical training is a more potent instrument than any other, because rhythm and harmony find their way into the inward places of the soul, on which they mightily fasten, imparting grace, and making the soul of him who is rightly educated graceful, or of him who is ill-educated ungraceful; and also because he who has received this true education of the inner being will most shrewdly perceive omissions or faults in art and nature, and with a true taste, while he praises and rejoices over and receives into his soul the good, and becomes noble and good, he will justly blame and hate the bad, now in the days of his youth, even before he is able to know the reason why; and when reason comes he will recognize and salute the friend with whom his education has made him long familiar ...
... Thus much of music, which makes a fair ending; for what should be the end of music if not the love of beauty? — Plato

Bucky's expression wasn't hostile, but it was serious. "Someday I'm going to fight and you won't be at my back."
"Nonsense. I'm your friend. Who I work for doesn't change that."
"If you leave it too long, you won't have a choice anymore. If the Steam Council turns on the people, each of us is going to have to decide where we belong."
"And you're going to play the rebel? You won't even carry a gun," Tobias snapped. "Your father may own an arms factory, but you make toys for a living."
"I don't carry a gun because I'm too good a shot," Bucky said quietly. "But when I fire, I don't miss. I never want to find you in my sights."
"It's not that simple," Tobias shot back, feeling a need for justification.
Bucky shrugged. "No, but the barons are running out of time, and that means we won't have many more chances to talk before everything falls apart. — Emma Jane Holloway

I've worked with the Warrens. For about 20 years. I was really good friends with Ed. Ed and Lorraine. We went our separate ways, there were a few differences. In their organization, being that they were from Connecticut, I started the New York City chapter of the organization and handled things in New York. But eventually I was out on my own. But I've been friends with them for a long time. — Ralph Sarchie

I love you, Savannah, and I always will," I breathed. "You're the best thing that's ever happened to me. You were my best friend and my lover, and I dont regret a single moment of it. You made me feel alive again, and most of all, you gave me my father. I'll never forget you for that. You're always going to be the very best part of me. I'm sorry it has to be this way, but I have to leave, and you have to see your husband." As I spoke, I could feel her shaking with sobs, and I continued to hold her for a long time afterward. When we finally seperated, I knew that it would be the last time I ever held her. I backed away, my eyes holding Savannah's. "I love you, too, John," she said. "Good-bye." I raised a hand. — Nicholas Sparks

We would like to have friendly regimes with enough broad participation of their populations to maintain long-term stability, so that we would have not only access to the region's wealth, but we would be able to ensure the security of our good friend Israel. — Frank Carlucci

I have a theory that as long as you have one good friend, one real friend, you can get through anything. — Dana Reinhardt

Walk with me." Abban held up his crutch.
"It is a long way to the palace, Par'chin," he said.
"I'll walk slowly," Arlen said, knowing the crutch had nothing to do with the refusal.
"You don't want to be seen with me outside the market, my friend," Abban warned. "That alone may cost you the respect you've earned in the Maze."
"Then I'll earn more," Arlen said. "What good is respect, if I can't walk with my friend? — Peter V. Brett

If this were a fairy tale, this would be the part where the fishboy appears and Diana shoots him through the heart. Because he is a tragic hero, he's our fucking Gatsby, and he lived for his fish and he has to die for his fish. He would never let my fake authority, condoning his abandonment, making up rules about what's okay just to save his life, convince him to give up his family. He would never leave.
He would know that without him, none of us will be as good. Me, without a friend; and the fish, without a brother; and the island, without a story; and Diana, without her something real, we will all be a little bit less than we were before we knew him.
So he wouldn't leave. Not until I could come with him. And I have never been less able to leave than I am now.
But this isn't a fairy tale, and he doesn't appear. We stand here for a long time.
He really left.
Because it was all that we could do. — Hannah Moskowitz

Home life is best for me. But I do enjoy the company of good friends whether from long ago or newer friends who only know me as George, not the ex-Beatle. — George Harrison

Now he was gone.
She said a silent prayer. Sent it up to heaven.
Sam, if you can hear me, I hope you've got nice food where you are. Some vegetables like these. They're meant to be good for you. So eat them all up, like I'm doing. When I die I'll come and see you, and we'll be together again. But for now I'm going to think of you safe and happy and playing knights with a friend.
Love from Ella. Your sister.
P.S. I got a good long turn with Godzilla today after we got here. Godzilla is very happy.
P.P.S. I forgot, you never met Godzilla. He is a puppy and is very cute. He belonged to a boy called Joel who got killed by monkeys. I think the monkeys were sick. Monkeys are usually nice. At least in stories.
P.P.P.S. Maybe you'll meet Joel where you are. Say hello. He is nice.
P.P.P.P.S. Good night, Sam. The others call you Small Sam. To me you're just Sam - my brother.
I miss you. I wish I was with you. — Charlie Higson

Beyond the East the sunrise, beyond the West the sea,
And East and West the wanderlust that will not let me be;
It works in me like madness, dear, to bid me say good-by!
For the seas call and the stars call, and oh, the call of the sky!

I know not where the white road runs, nor what the blue hills are,
But man can have the sun for friend, and for his guide a star;
And there's no end of voyaging when once the voice is heard,
For the river calls and the road calls, and oh, the call of a bird!

Yonder the long horizon lies, and there by night and day
The old ships draw to home again, the young ships sail away;
And come I may, but go I must, and if men ask you why,
You may put the blame on the stars and the sun and the white road and the sky! — Gerald Gould

Don't you recognize me, Mary? It's your good friend Allie the Outcast - although it looks like you're the one who's the out-cast now." Then Allie realized something with far too much glee. "Now that you're here - alive and all - there's something I've wanted to do for a very long time."
Then Allie reached back, curled her fleshie's right hand into a fist, and swung it toward Mary with all her might.
This was one strong fleshie!
The punch connected with Mary's eye so hard, that Mary's entire body spun around, and she collapsed into a leopard chair. Allie's knuckles hurt, but it was a good kind of pain.
"My eye!" wailed Mary. "Oh! My eye. — Neal Shusterman

Like so much of what is worthwhile in life, our needs for friendship are often best met in the home. If our children feel friendship within the family, with each other, and with parents, they will not be desperate for acceptance outside the family. I think one of life's most satisfying accomplishments for my wife and me is to have lived long enough to see our children become good friends. — Marlin K. Jensen

Taking the long view, we need to teach our kids street smarts, like the importance of walking with a friend instead of alone, and how to discern bad strangers from the overwhelming majority of good ones. If we prevent our children from learning how to navigate the world beyond our front yard, it will only come back to haunt them later on when they feel frightened, bewildered, lost, or confused out on the streets. — Julie Lythcott-Haims

Prayer helps us overcome the fear that is related to building our life just on the interpersonal - "What does he or she think of me? Who is my friend? Who is my enemy? Whom do I like? Dislike? Who rewards me? Punishes me? Says good things about me? Or doesn't?" We are concerned about personal identity and distinctions from others. As long as our sense of self depends on what other people think about us and say about us, and on how they respond to us, we become prisoners of the interpersonal, of that interlocking of people, of clinging to each other in a search for identity; we are no longer free but fearful. — Henri J.M. Nouwen

I have to go to her, Lucan. For my own sanity, if nothing else. If I stay here, I'm not sure what good I'd be, to tell you the truth. She's the only thing that's held me together in a very long time. I'm a wreck for this woman, my friend. She owns me now. — Lara Adrian

I have found nothing half so good / As my long-planned half solitude, / Where I can sit up half the night / With some friend that has the wit ... — William Butler Yeats

They meet, as we shall meet tomorrow, to murder one another; they kill and maim tens of thousands, and then have thanksgiving services for having killed so many people (they even exaggerate the number), and they announce a victory, supposing that the more people they have killed the greater their achievement. How does God above look at them and hear them?" exclaimed Prince Andrew in a shrill, piercing voice. "Ah, my friend, it has of late become hard for me to live. I see that I have begun to understand too much. And it doesn't do for man to taste of the tree of knowledge of good and evil ... Ah, well, it's not for long!" he added. — Leo Tolstoy

PRETEND YOU ARE DRIVING a car in the middle of a thunderstorm and you happen upon three people on the side of the road. One of them is a frail old woman, who looks on the verge of collapse. Another is a friend who once saved your life. The other is the romantic interest of your dreams, and this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to meet him or her. You have only one other seat in the car. Who do you pick up? There's a good reason to choose any of the three. The old woman needs help. The friend deserves your payback. And clearly, a happy future with the man or woman of your dreams will have an enormous long-term impact on your life. So, who should you pick? The old woman, of course. Then, give the car keys to your friend, and stay behind with the romantic interest to wait for the bus! — Shane Snow

I have led her home, my love, my only friend. There is none like her, none, And never yet so warmly ran my blood, And sweetly, on and on Calming itself to the long-wished for end, Full to the banks, close on the prom- ised good. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

He had left a certain mode of life and chosen another and between that life and this a river ran, as impassable as the river of death. And now he wanted to get back madly, desperately, but he couldn't, not even though he knew that the river was nothing but the inhibitions of his own mind ... A normal man who has lived utterly alone for a long time ceases to be normal. A solitary who has cut himself off from human contact comes to have a terror of his fellow humans. A coward who had abandoned all responsibility is afraid to shoulder it again. A failure cannot trust to success. A sufferer who has been broken by life dare not be friends with it again ... It was only his own mind that kept him back but a man's mind can be his greatest friend or his greatest enemy, according as it serves or binds his will, and his was his enemy. Its terrors controlled him. He was bound hand and foot by his own weakness. It was no use. He was a good as dead. I cannot get back. — Elizabeth Goudge

Farewell My Friend

It was beautiful as long as it lasted
The journey of my life.
I have no regrets whatsoever
save the pain I'll leave behind.
Those dear hearts who love and care...
And the strings pulling at the heart and soul...
The strong arms that held me up
When my own strength let me down.
At every turning of my life
I came across good friends,
Friends who stood by me,
Even when the time raced me by.
Farewell, farewell my friends
I smile and bid you goodbye.
No, shed no tears for I need them not
All I need is your smile.
If you feel sad do think of me
for that's what I'll like
when you live in the hearts
of those you love, remember then
you never die. — Gitanjali Ghei

You're asking yourself, Can I give this child the best possible upbringing and keep her out of harm's way her whole life long? The answer is no, you can't. But nobody else can either. Not a state home, that's for sure. For heaven's sake, the best they can do is turn their heads while the kids learn to pick locks and snort hootch, and then try to keep them out of jail. Nobody can protect a child from the world. That's why it's the wrong thing to ask, if you're really trying to make a decision."
So what's the right thing to ask?"
Do I want to try? Do I think it would be interesting, maybe even enjoyable in the long run, to share my life with this kid and give her my best effort and maybe, when all's said and done, end up with a good friend. — Barbara Kingsolver

I am thrilled with my fan base. For some reason some of them are quite young, so they are quite frightened. I remember when I did 'Click' and I'd see Adam Sandler's fan base. He's the guy that people feel that he's their best friend, so he's walking down the street and people sort of high five him and want to tell him a joke or invite him to come home and have a sandwich with them. Mine are not like that. Mine tend to go: 'Argh,' and look horrified. They shake and take a picture from a really long way away. I do feel I've got quite good, respectful ones though. — Colin Farrell

And it came to me that these trees had been hardly smaller when I was yet unborn, and had stood as they stood now when I was a child playing among the cypresses and peaceful tombs of our necropolis, and that they would stand yet, drinking in the light of the dying sun, even as now, when I had been dead as long as those who rested there. I saw how little it weighed on the scale of things whether I lived or died, though my life was precious to me. And of those two thoughts I forged a mood by which I stood ready to grasp each smallest chance to live, yet in which I cared not too much whether I saved myself or not. By that mood, as I think, I did live; it has been so good a friend to me that I have endeavored to wear it ever since, succeeding not always, but often. — Gene Wolfe

For a long time, all the way through to the end of elementary school, Beans was my only friend. Because that's how I've always been. I only need one good friend to see me through. Most people aren't like that. Most people are always looking out for more people to know. In the end, Beans was like most people. After a while she had dozens of friends, and by fifth grade it was pretty obvious that even though she was my best friend, I wasn't hers. — Carol Rifka Brunt

Death can be a good friend to those in extreme pain. I wondered how he held on so long ... — V.C. Andrews

I'm not trying to be self-righteous about that, but I am literally the best friend a person could ask for and I am a good listener and anybody who doesn't want to be my friend should take a long, hard look at him/herself and whisper, What is wrong with me? Why was I born without the capacity to love? — Katie Heaney

The world is going under, I thought, and this notion so little surprised me, it seemed as though I had been waiting a long time for just that to happen. But now, from amid the burning and collapsing city, I saw a boy come toward me. His hands were buried in his pockets and he hopped and skipped from one leg to another, resilient and light-hearted. Then he stopped and emitted an ingenious whistle
our signal from grade school days, and the boy was my friend who had shot himself when he was a student. Immediately I too became, like him, a boy of twelve, and the burning city and the distant thunder and the blustering storm of howling voices from all corners of the world sounded wondrously exquisite to our newly awakened ears. Now everything was good, and the dark nightmare in which I had lived for so many despairing years was gone forever. — Hermann Hesse

F
off. It's not like that. Her and me. I'm just saying
"
"That you hadn't left her for good. I never said you had. You just wanted to withdraw long enough to get used to the idea that you'd lost your chance. Lick your wounds, suck it in, and bounce back to being her friend and mentor, and be happy with just that."
"I am happy with just that. It's all I want."
"Is it? Or is that what you're telling yourself because you think you never had a shot in the first place? You'd better wake up fast, Jack, or she's going to settle for Quinn, and let me tell you, it's settling, because it's not Quinn she
— Kelley Armstrong

Be apprised, though, that the Maine Lobster Festival's democratization of lobster comes with all the massed inconvenience and aesthetic compromise of real democracy. See, for example, the aforementioned Main Eating Tent, for which there is a constant Disneyland-grade queue, and which turns out to be a square quarter mile of awning-shaded cafeteria lines and rows of long institutional tables at which friend and stranger alike sit cheek by jowl, cracking and chewing and dribbling. It's hot, and the sagged roof traps the steam and the smells, which latter are strong and only partly food-related. It is also loud, and a good percentage of the total noise is masticatory. — David Foster Wallace

It is difficult to live in such a way that all our relationships are in effective control, and usually it doesn't make that much difference as long as some relationships are satisfying. But when you get sick, it is a good idea to review all of them. Some may be more rankling than you are willing to admit. You can review these relationships by yourself; with the help of a friend or family member you trust; with your doctor if he or she can give you the time; or, best of all, with the aid of a good counselor. — William Glasser

Good friend, don't forget all I've taught you; take to heart my commands. They'll help you live a long, long time, a long life lived full and well. 3-4 Don't lose your grip on Love and Loyalty. Tie them around your neck; carve their initials on your heart. Earn a reputation for living well in God's eyes and the eyes of the people. 5-12 Trust GOD from the bottom of your heart; don't try to figure out everything on your own. Listen for GOD's voice in everything you do, everywhere you go; he's the one who will keep you on track. Don't assume that you know it all. — Anonymous

My friend I wish health to you,
I also wish wealth to you;
I wish the best that life can give to you,
And may dreams always come true to you.
May fortune to kind to you,
And happiness be true to you;
And love be so sweet to you
And life be long and good to you.
And in this toast we give to you
Our love we all give to you. — Willie Jolley

You remember how homesick I used to get, and what long talks we used to have coming from school? We've someway always felt alike about things."
"Yes, that's it; we've liked the same things and we've liked them together, without anybody else knowing. And we've had good times, hunting for Christmas trees and going for ducks and making our plum wine together every year. We've never either of us had any other close friend. And now
— Willa Cather

My dear friend, what is this our life? A boat that swims in the sea, and all one knows for certain about it is that one day it will capsize. Here we are, two good old boats that have been faithful neighbors, and above all your hand has done its best to keep me from "capsizing"! Let us then continue our voyage - each for the other's sake, for a long time yet, a long time! We should miss each other so much! Tolerably calm seas and good winds and above all sun - what I wish for myself, I wish for you, too, and am sorry that my gratitude can find expression only in such a wish and has no influence at all on wind or weather! — Friedrich Nietzsche

I have seen doctors, in good faith, leave patients on steroids for years, thinking they are doing right. A friend of mine was on steroids for so long, she has severe osteoporosis. — Mary Ann Mobley

I take you to be my best friend, my lover, my husband, and the father of our children. I will cherish our union and love you more each day than I did the day before. I will trust you and respect
you, laugh with you and cry with you, loving you faithfully through good times and bad, regardless of the obstacles we may face together. I give you my hand, my heart, and my love from this day forward, for as long as we both shall live. You will always be every song I sing. — Georgia Cates

Suffice it to say Cherie Snodgrass and I were good friends a long, long time ago. After Mr Snodgrass confronted my wife, the friendship ended and my marriage remained intact. — Henry Hyde

The book is silent as long as you need silence,
eloquent whenever you want discourse.
He never interrupts you if you are engaged
but if you feel lonely he will be a good companion.
He is a friend who never deceives or falters you,
and he is a companion who does not grow tired of you. — Al-Jahiz

She couldn't hide from everyone for the rest of her life ... Well she could. That was the direction things were going. But she knew from long-ago experience that when you were uncertain and if you were courageous enough to let her in a real friend could do a world of good. — Ann Brashares

Don't let strangers touch you. And yet it is seldom strangers, I learned long before I was a teenager, who do you harm. It is always the ones closest to us: the suave chauffeur, the skilled photographer, the kind music teacher, the good friend's sober and dignified husband, the pious man of God. They are the ones your parents trust, whom they don't want to believe anything against. — Azar Nafisi

I have always had a weakness for footnotes. For me a clever or a wicked footnote has redeemed many a text. And I see that I am now using a long footnote to open a serious subject - shifting in a quick move to Paris, to a penthouse in the Hotel Crillon. Early June. Breakfast time. The host is my good friend Professor Ravelstein, Abe Ravelstein. My wife and I, also staying at the Crillon, have a room below, on the sixth floor. She is still asleep. The entire floor below ours (this is not absolutely relevant but somehow I can't avoid mentioning it) is occupied just now by Michael Jackson and his entourage. He performs nightly in some vast Parisian auditorium. Very soon his French fans will arrive and a crowd of faces will be turned upward, shouting in unison, 'Miekell Jack-sown'. A police barrier holds the fans back. Inside, from the sixth floor, when you look down the marble stairwell you see Michael's bodyguards. One of them is doing the crossword puzzle in the 'Paris Herald'. — Saul Bellow

But before I could come up with an answer, Tod appeared in the desk chair, where I'd sat minutes earlier. 'Hey. Am I interrupting something?'
'Yes,' Nash said. 'Get out.'
But Tod was watching me, and I could tell from the angry line of his jaw that he'd been listening long before he showed himself. He'd heard what Avari had done to me. What Nash had let him do.
'You want me to go?' Tod asked me, his back to his brother.
Nash implores me silently to say yes. Tod waited patiently.
'No,' I said, looking right at Nash. He scowled, and his shoulders sagged.
'Good.' Tod stood and kicked the rolling chair out of his way. 'I just checked on your friend in the straitjacket. But first ... ' The reaper swung before either of us realized what he intended to do.
Tod's very sold first slammed into Nash's jaw. Nash's head snapped back. He stumbled into the wall. Tod shook his hand like it hurt. 'That's for what you let him do to Kaylee. — Rachel Vincent

When a nation which has long groaned under the intolerable yoke of a tyrant rises at last and throws off its chains, do you call that weakness? The man who, to rescue his house from the flames, finds his physical strength redoubled, so that he lifts burdens with ease which in the absence of excitement he could scarcely move; he who under the rage of an insult attacks and puts to flight half a score of his enemies, - are such persons to be called weak? My good friend, if resistance be strength, how can the highest degree of resistance be a weakness? — Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

To every good friend I send my greet feet; addio nitwit. Love true true true until the grave, if I live that long and do behave. — Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Here's a stanza from page 68 where the heel of a narrator makes the following observations regarding his "girl-friend" during a post-tryst afterglow:

Several hours later we were lying in her bed, exhausted...
After that one, in the dim lamplight of her bedroom, diffused through the sheets as if through a scrim, I took a good look at her and tried to figure out how she got to me the way she did.

Her face was long enough to qualify as horsy, with a nose to proportion, ever so slightly bulbous & two or three degrees off-true to the left; her teeth were a little too prominent, her lower incisors an ivory jumble, and with her hair up her ears looked like saucers.
There was no denying, though, that she got me going in a way few others ever had.

"Jesus, it's still freezing in here," she said.
— Scott Phillips

ON THE RETURN OF A BOOK
LENT TO A FRIEND
I GIVE humble and hearty thanks for the safe return of this book which having endured the perils of my friend's bookcase, and the bookcases of my friend's friends, now returns to me in reasonably good condition.
I GIVE humble and hearty thanks that my friend did not see fit to give this book to his infant as a plaything, nor use it as an ash-tray for his burning cigar, nor as a teething-ring for his mastiff.
WHEN I lent this book I deemed it as lost: I was resigned to the bitterness of the long parting: I never thought to look upon its pages again.
BUT NOW that my book is come back to me, I rejoice and am exceeding glad! Bring hither the fatted morocco and let us rebind the volume and set it on the shelf of honour: for this my book was lent, and is returned again.
PRESENTLY, therefore, I may return some of the books that I myself have borrowed. — Christopher Morley

I'm always striving to lose weight. And it's not a matter of wanting to be a size 3 again - I brought out my leotards, and a friend thought they were doll clothes. Being heavy isn't good for you. How long can your heart take the strain? So, I never give up, but it's hard. — Liz Torres

But let me just say that talking dirty is so important in sex. And it's pretty easy. To wit: establish from the very beginning that you like this. And trust me, you want to do it early on. Because if you wait too long to introduce the concept, your Special Lady Friend will be a little thrown and might not take you seriously. Think of it as a hat. If you never, ever wear a hat and one day you try to rock a fedora with a feather, all of your friends will be like, "Dude - why are you wearing a fucking fedora with a fucking feather?" You'll feel insecure and never wear it again. Now imagine that scenario, but in bed with your hardened dick out and it's your girlfriend saying, "Dude - why the fuck are you talking like that?" Not good. — Olivia Munn